playing pretend
by Nygmatech
Summary: "So, who is the culprit?" A slightly different look on the Kira case. L/Raito if you squint.


playing pretend

_So, who is the culprit?_

On the first day, they are all handed a little plastic card—to memorise and quickly tuck away before it can be caught sight of by anyone else in the vicinity.

He looks down. _Raito Yagami_, his card read. Well, he'd already known that. It proclaims him as seventeen years old (a lie, he'll _be_ seventeen in February), and just under that is a single word.

_Kira_, the card challenges, and he tucks it into an inside pocket of his shirt.

He looks up. Plain brown meets expressionless black, and Lawliet could have almost sworn he saw the plain brown pair flash scarlet.

A trick of the light, he thinks.

"Does Yagami-kun require anything?"

"No," he says back, a perfectly charming smile curving his lips upward. "Nothing."

_You know the answer to that question,_

It takes an upward of two days to work out his exact method of killing, and by then he has quite a large list, penned down carefully by hand in his little black notebook, lying atop the rest of his schoolbooks like nothing.

"Raito!" his mother calls up the stairs. "One of your friends is here; I'll send him up for you!"

In retrospect, he isn't entirely surprised to see Lawliet standing in his doorway, nor when he closes the door quietly behind him, dark eyes fixed on his face.

"Raito-kun," he says, and Raito's eyes flicker to the doorknob in something that might have been alarm as Lawliet turns the lock with a _click_, "is Kira."

His posture relaxes in the office chair, and he crosses his legs carelessly, that easy smile on his face as he reaches for the black notebook.

"Did you need anything, Ryuuzaki-san?"

"Yes," is the simple answer, and Lawliet moves farther into the room. "I require a great deal from Yagami-kun."

"Then let us get started."

_Because it all happened in front of your eyes._

They meet like this once or twice a week; a first it was merely L and Kira, the case, the murders—and now it's become something more _Ryuuzaki_ and _Raito-kun_. They talk about anything and everything (_nothing_).

It's improper and could potentially get Lawliet in trouble, however they both let it happen anyways. There's nothing unusual about their relationship (_on the surface_), other than that Raito is only sixteen and Lawliet is close going on twenty five. But that's alright; it isn't as if either of them mind. Raito's "friends" his own age offer him nothing—and Lawliet is surprised enough that this _boy _is the only person who has managed to grab his attention since his three little cousins.

It is, however, awkward enough for the both of them when Sachiko invites Lawliet to stay for dinner. They make small talk and Sachiko expresses how glad she is that Raito is finally "branching out and making friends."

_There may be more than one answer._

His Second Kira approaches him soon thereafter—he's blonde and overconfident and has a figure most women would die to have, and Raito immediately dislikes him.

"Of course, I would be delighted to have your help, Keehl-san."

Privately, he thinks: I can do this on my own.

"Play nicely," Lawliet tells him.

_But that means that the answer is about to disappear..._

The killings continue, and no one is any closer to guessing the killer. Sometimes, it seems, they are merely too frightened of a possible response to voice to Lawliet their suspicions. A pity, really. This game isn't _quite_ as fun anymore.

Ah, but perhaps he should just spice things up a little bit more. Someone among them, perhaps?

He catches an icy cyan gaze, and casually pulls the notebook out of his backpack.

_Mihael Keehl must die_.

It's almost like covering his tracks, he thinks, as he purposefully lets the notebook drop to the floor. The Second Kira bends down to pick it up for him, and their eyes meet again before the cyan pair flickers down to the two words spelled out on the page in painfully neat letters.

"Thanks."

Forty seconds later, Raito stares resolutely up at the front of the room as at a table behind him, Mihael simulates with terrible precision the exact attributes of a heart attack.

Lawliet's eyes never leave Raito's face.

_Even if you don't say the answer, I will answer it for you,_

"I was bored," Lawliet admits to him one day, another evening spent locked in Raito's room going over names and numbers and figures—because all Lawliet needs is a little evidence, which Raito duly hides from him. "I find no enlightenment in my daily life."

That, in itself, does not wholly surprise Raito. He knows exactly what Lawliet feels—this aching boredom, day in, day out, no reprieve.

"So you create the perfect crime," Raito murmurs, looking at the man with something new in his expression. "You _purposely _pick out the killer, because you knew you wouldn't be able to beat me."

"Raito-kun is growing too sure of his abilities," is the quiet response. "However, yes. He is correct."

This, Raito notes, is just about as close to surrender as he will get. L is defeated. Kira is justice.

"...Why don't we let the case rest for now?" Raito asks casually, standing up from the desk chair, and crossing the room to sit on his bed, motioning for the dark-haired man to join him.

"Cone over here, Ryuuzaki. We'll call it an experiment."

(_This_, he thinks, as he threads his fingers through Lawliet's hair, pushing him down onto the bed, _is the ultimate form of surrender_).

_The way this crime will end._

The year, as it turns out, goes off with a bang.

He's sitting in the classroom, feeling wholly satisfied with himself as the teacher announces to the class that, being the start of the last week of school, it is his duty to announce that "Kira" has won.

No one speaks up against.

Lawliet, Raito decides, has taught him far more than any of his other teachers combined.

(_Lawliet_, Raito thinks privately, _has given him more than anyone he knows._)

He is unprepared, then, when the last sentence is cut off—and Lawliet's hands fly to his chest. Dark eyes widen, and before Raito knows what he is doing, he's thrown himself forward to catch the teacher (_detective_) before he tumbles off of his chair.

"_Ryuuzaki!_"

They fall to the floor in a jumbled mess of limbs—detective and killer, teacher and student—and even though Raito knows it's merely a trick, he holds him as he "dies."

The bell rings, and class is dismissed. The students scatter and leave the classroom—and the two are left alone.

"..._Raito-kun?"_

_So, who is the culprit?_

_..._

_Say my name..._

**A/N: I tricked you. I tricked you into reading a high school AU kolkol~**

**-/hit with a brick-**


End file.
